Starry Nights

NGC 7129

2011-09-08T03:03:00.005+03:00

NGC 7129 is a flower like shaped reflection Nebula and star forming region in Cepheus.

Telescope: AT8RC
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 15hrs
Processing: deepskystacker, Pixinsight, Photoshop
Location: Corithnia, Greece

M33

2011-08-26T01:19:00.005+03:00

Telescope: AT8RC
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 5hours and 10 min
Processing: Pixinsight, ps
Location: Corinthia, Greece

M51 Galaxy

2011-03-22T02:44:00.002+02:00

Telescope: AT8RC
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 26x10 min
Processing: Pixinsight 1.5
Seeing: 4 arc sec
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia

First light with the AT8RC.
The photo doesn't include flats or bias, and needs double the exposures to reduce the noise.

NGC 2146 Galaxy

2011-03-22T02:42:00.003+02:00

A small peculiar Galaxy in Camelopardalis.

Telescope: C9.25 F/6.3
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 20x300 sec
Processing: Pixinsight 1.5 core, Photoshop cs3, pseudoflats were used.
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia
Seeing 3,5 arc sec, Transparency 3/5

Christmass tree

2011-03-22T02:36:00.002+02:00

Telescope: Ed80
Camera: QHY8
Exposure: 6x900 sec
Processing: Pixinisight 1.5 core, Photoshop cs3
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia

Only 6 out of 15 exposures, the rest couldn;t be used due to humidity.

NGC 7129

2011-03-22T02:29:00.004+02:00

NGC 7129 in Cepheus. A nebula inside a rich star field with an open cluster near it. There is also nebulosity all around this area, but it needed more exposures to show better.

Telescope: Skywatcher ED80
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 12x1200 sec bin 1x1
Procsessing: Pixinsight 1.5
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia

Horsehead and Flame Nebulae

2011-03-22T02:22:00.001+02:00

Telescope: ED80
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 5x1200 sec
Processing: Pixinsight 1.5, Photoshop cs3
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia

Only rgb.

Rosette Nebula

2011-03-22T02:15:00.002+02:00

Telescope: ED80
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 15X1200 sec bin 1x1
Processing: Pixinsight 1.5, Photoshop cs3
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia

IC 1805, Heart Nebula

2011-03-22T02:12:00.002+02:00

Telescope: ED80
Mount: HEQ5 pro autoguided with QHY5
Guide scope: Bresser 70/700
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 12X1200 sec Ha bin 1X1, 5X10 min bin 1X1 color
Processing: Pixinsight

Pleiades M45

2011-03-22T02:02:00.008+02:00

Telescope: Skywatcher ED80
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 5X15 min bin 1X1
Processing: Maxim DL v5, Photoshop cs3

Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia

The blog is now active again.

2011-03-22T01:31:00.002+02:00

For a couple of years i switched to a website containing my images, but i have decided that the blog is more easy to use, and has that nice touch of like reading a book or a magazine, with articles and stories about events and not only for posting images. Thus, i am posting everything here that hasn't been posted during this time.

NGC 7000 North America Nebula

2009-09-02T04:00:00.010+03:00

Telescope: Skywatcher ED80
Guide scope: Bresser 70/700
Mount: HEQ6 pro autoguided
Camera: QHY8
Guide camera: QHY5

M8 Lagoon Nebula

2009-06-06T03:12:00.002+03:00

The Lagoon Nebula

Telescope: Skywatcher ED80
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 5X15 min bin 1X1, 1X15 min bin 2X2
Location: Kithairon mountain

M16 Eagle Nebula

2009-06-06T03:08:00.003+03:00

The Eagle Nebula.
Telescope: Skywatcher ED80
Camera: QHY8
Exposures: 3X15 min, bin 1X1
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia

A night in Sounio

2009-03-07T00:24:00.006+02:00

Photo by Costas (ckld)

At Saturday February 28 we went to the Sounio area in Attica, in the region north of the temple of Poseidon. The sky there is good considering it's close to Athens. Maybe around 5.5 mag when looking east and at zenith. We were around 10 people, with 6 scopes. It was the official first light for my 6" f5 refractor.

Oh boy! I had some concerns about colour for this scope, but with a William Optics VR-1 filter the colour is little on the very bright stars. I acquired this scope simply for the widefield views, deep sky views in general, and portability. So i knew that it wouldnt do that good in planteray observation. Nevertheless with the filter and by putting the aperture stop on it making it 115mm and f6.5, i could see Saturn almost without any colour abberation. The view was sharp up until 120X. I didnt have a smaller eyepiece with me to try higher mags.

On deep sky the scope rocks! I thought that with the 6 inches of aperture i wouldn't be able to see the popular galaxies that good, but, oh boy, Leo triplet, M81 and M82, the Sombrero, M51 and other galaxies were there clearly visible without averted vision and with detail to be seen. It seems that a 6 inch refractor is actually like a 7 inch Newtonian, due to the lack of central obstruction, and due to the refrctor contrast, it delivers very nice views in many targets. The Double Cluster was glorious, and you could see the stars at M13 even at a lower magnification. The eyepieces that i used were a 13mm Nagler and an 20mm WO swa, and a 2x Televue barlow. Even though the Nagler is a fine eyepiece, i mostly used the 20 swa because it gave brighter views at most objects. I used the barlow with the Nagler at M13 to see if i could reslove the vore, and even though you could see the individual stars, the image wasnt that good at that magnification. It was far more better in the 8 inch Orion Optics Newtonian of a friend of mine, where the stars were resolved more easily at this mag. But hey, i expected that an f5 refractor wouldn't be able to show very good views in high magnifications, mainly due to the chromatic and spherical aberration. But in lower magnifications the views were outstanding.

All in all, we had a very nice night under the stars, and it was almost 3 months since we had a chance for a star party under a crystal clear sky, due to the weather.

After 3 days we went back there with a friend of mine, but the conditions were not good for observing. Although the sky cleared after the moon set, the humidity was high. We had to clean our eyepieces every half a minute or so. I was able though to look through a 32mm eyepiece in my scope. Very nice views. I hadn't taken the EQ6 with me, so i was searching the targets the old fashoned way, with the refractor on a Vixen porta alt az mount. So the 32mm eyepiece was very nice as a finder, and gave stunning views of large objects, like open clusters. :)

Theophilus

2009-03-06T23:20:00.000+02:00

Crater Theophilus and area.
Telescope: C9.25 at f10
Camera: DMK21Au04 with red filter
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Moon mosaic 2

2009-03-06T23:15:00.000+02:00

Another moon mosaic, when the moon was at around 35% phase.
Telescope: C9.25 at f10
Camera: DMK21AU04 with red filter
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Maurolycus

2009-03-06T23:14:00.000+02:00

Crater Maurolycus.
Telescope: C9.25 at f20
Camera: DMK21AU04
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Eratosthenes

2009-03-06T23:12:00.000+02:00

Crater Eratosthenes.
Telescope: C9.25 at f10
Camera: DMK21AU04 with red filter
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Clavius area

2009-03-06T23:11:00.000+02:00

A mosaic of crater Clavius and area.
Telescope: C9.25 at f10
Camera: DMK21AU04 with red filter
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Moon mosaic

2009-03-06T23:05:00.000+02:00

A partial mosaic of the moon. Composed of 25 photos.
Telescope: C9.25 at f10
Camera: DMk21Au04 with red filter
Processing: 25 avis processed in Registax 4, Photoshop cs3.

Saturn

2009-03-06T23:04:00.001+02:00

Saturn. The lord of the rings.
Telescope: C9.25 at f20
Camera: Phillips SPC900NC
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Jupiter

2009-03-06T23:01:00.000+02:00

Jupiter. The largest planet of our solar system.
Telescope: C9.25 at f20
Camera: Phillips SPC900NC
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Schiller crater

2009-03-06T22:59:00.000+02:00

Crater Schiller and area.
Telescope: C9.25 at f10
Camera: DMK21AU04
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Nearch craters

2009-03-06T22:38:00.000+02:00

Craters Nearch A,B, and C
Telescope: C9.25 at f20
Camera: DMK21AU04 with red filter
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Nearch mosaic

2009-03-06T22:35:00.000+02:00

Craters Mutus, Nearch A and B, and Bussingault.
Telescope: C9.25 at f20
Camera: DMK21AU04 with red filter
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Cassini mosaic

2009-03-06T22:28:00.000+02:00

The Cassini crater and area
Telescope: C9.25 at f20
Camera: DMK21AU04 with red filter
Processing: Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Archimedes mosaic

2009-03-06T22:22:00.000+02:00

This is a mosaic of 2 pictures of the Archimedes Crater at the left, and the surrounding area.
Telescope: C9.25 at f20
Camera: DMK21AU04 with red filter
Processing: 2 avis with 1800 frames each, Registax 4, Photoshop cs3

Milky Way

2009-03-06T22:18:00.001+02:00

This is the Milky way imaged from my village during the summer. Just above the tree is Jupiter, and at the right is the gallactic center.
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia
Camera: Canon eos 450D at iso 800
Exposures: 1x6 mins.
Processing: Photoshop cs3

M22 Globular Cluster

2009-03-06T22:14:00.000+02:00

This is M22 Globular Cluster.
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia
Telescope: Ed80 at f7.5
Camera: Canon eos 400D at iso 1600
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

Double Cluster

2009-03-06T21:55:00.000+02:00

The Double Cluster in Perseus. It is one of the most beautiful targets to be seen through a telescope.
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia
Telescope: Skywatcher ED80 at f7.5
Camera: Canon eos 400D at iso 1600
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

M42 Orion Nebula

2009-03-06T21:46:00.000+02:00

Location: Rafina, Attica
Telescope: ED80 at f7.5
Camera: Canon eos 450D at iso 1600
Exposures: lights 2X2 mins, darks 2X2 mins
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

M13 globular cluster

2009-03-06T21:42:00.000+02:00

This is M13, the largest globular cluster that we can see from the northen hemisphere.
Location: Kithaironas mountain, near Attica
Telescope: C9.25 at f6.3
Camera: Canon eos 400D at iso 1600
Processing: depskystacker, Photoshop cs3

Center of IC 1805 Heart Nebula

2009-03-06T21:37:00.000+02:00

This is the center of the Heart Nebula.
Location: Athens, Greece
Telescope: ED80 at f7.5
Camera: Atik 314L with Astronomik Ha 13nm filter
Exposures: Ha 3X10 min
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

M46 open cluster

2009-03-06T21:33:00.000+02:00

M46 open cluster and planetary nebula NGC 2438
Location: Athens, Greece
Telescope: C9.25 at f6.3
Camera: Atik 314L red filter
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

M39 open cluster

2009-03-06T20:45:00.000+02:00

Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia
Telescope: Skywatcher Ed80 at f7.5
Camera: Canon eos 450D at iso 1600
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

M45 Pleiades

2009-03-06T20:41:00.000+02:00

M45 is the largest open star cluster that we can see from Earth.
Location: Chiliomodi, Corinthia
Telescope: Skywatcher ED80 at f7.5
Camera: Canon eos 450D at iso 1600
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

M27 Dumbell Nebula

2009-03-06T20:30:00.000+02:00

M27 is the first planetary nebula ever discovered. The central star is a 13.5 mag blueish blueish subdwarf dwarf.

Telescope: C9.25 at f6.3
Camera: Canon eos 400D at iso 1600
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

M33 galaxy

2009-03-06T20:25:00.000+02:00

M33 is a face on spiral galaxy.
Telescope: Skywatcher ED80 at F7.5
Camera: Canon eos 450D
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3

M31 Andromeda Galaxy

2009-03-06T20:16:00.000+02:00

M31 is the nearest and the largest galaxy in our local galaxies group. It has two smaller gallactic companions, M32 and M110.
Location: Kithaironas mountain, near Attica Greece
Telescope: Skywatcher ED80 at F7.5
Camera: Canon eos 450D at iso 1600
Exposures: lights 5X5 mins, darks 5X5 mins.
Processing: deepskystacker, Photoshop cs3.

Welcome to Starry Nights

2009-03-06T18:43:00.000+02:00

This is my amateur astronomy blog. I am Stathis Mexias and i live in Athens Greece. In this blog you can see my astrophotos as well as my observation reports, and other interesting stuff. Observations and imaging are usually made from places around Attica or from my village which is 110km from Athens, in the Peloponnese.